P 26 Student's usage and awareness on the information resources and services of the Library, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Ruhuna: A case study

Abstract

A survey was carried out in the Library, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Ruhuna to assess the usage and awareness of the undergraduates on the main information resources and services of the library. Questionnaire method of survey was used for data collection among 140 undergraduates who were selected for the study using stratified random sampling technique. Out of main services offered by the Library, the basic lending and reference service and the access to online catalogue were highly used by the respondents while the Inter Library Loan service is used by only 12.7% respondents. The awareness as well as usage is high of the main resources such as books and journals but CD-ROM collection was under-utilized due to unawareness of the availability. In response to their level of satisfaction against various facilities of the library, the results revealed that the majority of respondents (94.9%) were satisfied about the collection of the library. Among them 34.7% are highly satisfied while 60.1% are somewhat satisfied about the library collection. The respondents were also satisfied about the reading room facility (37. 3%), general condition and maintenance (39.8%) and the noise level (53.4%) of the library. It is interesting to note that more respondents (54.2%) were very satisfied about the library staff support. Respondents showed their dissatisfaction against the availability of computer facility and seating capacity of the library. Majority of respondents suggested that user awareness programs should be adopted to make aware of the resources and services available in the library to enhance the usage of resources and services offered by the Library.